City hospital performs cross-blood group liver transplantation

Surgeries done using glycosorb, a device developed in Japan

Two patients who underwent liver transplantation interacting with S. Thiagarajan, left, Director, and Karthik Mathivanan, Associate Director, Institute of Liver Diseases, MGM Healthcare, in Chennai on Wednesday. | Photo Credit: K. PICHUMANI

Four patients underwent cross blood group liver transplantation at a hospital here recently. All of them are doing well, according to the doctors who performed the procedure.

Director of Institute of Liver Diseases at MGM Healthcare S. Thiagarajan said the hospital had been performing incompatible blood group (ABOi) liver transplant surgeries for a year. Annually, only 10% of over one lakh patients requiring liver transplant find cadaveric organs whereas the remaining 90% were unable to go for it because of incompatible blood group.

Japan had come up with a technology to overcome this problem. “We learnt the technology from Japan and started using the new technology,” Dr. Thiagarajan said. Of the two patients presented before the media on Wednesday, one from Kerala developed chronic liver failure and had been waiting for more than three years for a donor. He could not find a compatible living donor in his family or cadaver donor. The other patient had been waiting for over a year. The doctor said the other two patients were in north India .

Before an incompatible donor transplantation, the patient was well prepared for it. The technology includes use of glycosorb, a highly selective blood group antibody absorption device, besides administering drugs to prevent antibody production for the new blood group and the existing blood group antibodies.

According to Karthik Mathivanan, associate director, over two lakh people die of liver disease in India every year. At present, only around 1,800-1,900 liver transplantations were done. The advancements in the field made it possible for the institute to develop an alternative strategy to increase the donor pool. The risk in the cross-blood transplantation was around 2-3% higher than that of the regular procedure. The hospital had performed four ABOi liver transplants using the technology and the same had been used in kidney transplantation as well.

It cost ₹4 lakh to ₹5 lakh more than the conventional procedure, Dr. Thiagarajan said and urged the State government to cover pre-surgery expenses as well under the Chief Minister’s Comprehensive Health Insurance Scheme.